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Chapter 15 Lecture Notes
Transcript
Chapter 15
Social Movements
Introduction
Social Movement: a large group of people trying to bring about or resist social change.
Small change, e.g., diverting a highway
Large change, e.g., transforming an economic order
About values and morals, e.g., pro-lifers
About economic issues, e.g., anti-poverty groups
Collective behaviour: a large number of people do not accept some of the prevailing values, norms, leaders of society: least to most institutionalized.
Collective Behaviour
Panics: people are overcome and try to save themselves with immediate action.
Crowds: collective behaviour when it departs from conventional behaviour, e.g., fight at a soccer game.
Fad: unconventional practices that spread rapidly and last for a short time.
Craze: a fad with intense commitment, that is considered strange, e.g., streaking.
Public: large dispersed group made up of people with an interest.
Social movement: large collectivity trying to bring about or resist social change.
Theories of Collective Behaviour
Social contagion: Blumer—“the relatively rapid, unwitting, and non-rational dissemination of a mood, impulse, or form of conduct.”
Criticism: exaggerates the unanimity of collective behaviour.
(cont’d)
Theories of Collective Behaviour (cont’d)
Emergent norm theory: great diversity among people in a crowd, but the members are under the impression that most others are in agreement and they conform to the apparent will of the crowd.
Criticism:
Irrationality implied in the concept of social contagion has been largely rejected
Insufficient attention to social structure
Insufficient attention to interest groups and conflict
It can be institutionalized
Social Breakdown
Social breakdown approach: when unrest occurs, people become “uprooted” and become susceptible to the appeal of a movement.
Durkheim noted the importance of social integration, attachment to social groups.
Criticism: institutions can also promote social unrest.
Relative Deprivation
Relative deprivation: gap between what people believe they have a right to receive and what they actually receive.
Movements are more likely to occur when people are frustrated than when their welfare is declining.
Criticism: focuses on conditions that immediately precede a social movement.
Collective Action Approaches
Collective action: institutionalized and non-institutionalized activity in pursuit of a goal.
Concerned with the character, not the amount of social unrest, and change of character
Identifies cleavage factors, which separate people, and integrating factors that bind people
Discontent is not a sufficient condition; it must be mobilized
Resource Mobilization
Mobilization: transfer of resources from one kind of collective action to another. It is an organizational problem.
Conditions to assist mobilization:
Ideology: set of beliefs that provide a basis for action, define goals
Frame: principles that enable people to make sense of their world
(cont’d)
Resource Mobilization (cont’d)
Leadership
Effective means of communicating
Network of cooperative relationships
Financial resources make organizing easier. Only those who are better off have the resources to organize a social movement and impress their demands.
Game Theory
Used to analyze crowds and social movements
Game Theory – Study of optimal decision making
Key traits of decision makers
Rational
They try and anticipate the actions and reactions of other decision makers
Game Theory assumes people behave rationally in crowds and make decision based on relative payoffs and costs of certain behaviours (cont’d)
Game Theory (Cont’d)
Free-rider problem – If a large number of people can benefit from a collective effort, the most rational behavior for a self-interested person is to let others do the work
Selective incentives – The direct benefits a person can derive from belonging to an association of joining a social movement
Coordination Problem – People want to participate but will only do so if others
will participate as well
Marxist Explanations
Marxists are interested in
Bourgeoisie revolts to overthrow feudalism
Revolts to overthrow capitalism
Capitalism creates exploitation and polarizes classes to mobilize workers for collective action.
Gramsci argued importance of non-economic struggles against the existing order.
Hegemony: domination of a class over others, not just economically but politically and culturally.
Political Opportunity Structure
Focuses on the political opportunities available to leaders and participants, e.g., according to the degree of openness, stability, availability of allies and elite conflict of the area.
Recognizes the way in which social movements are shaped by forces beyond the control of members, despite literature which centers on the intentional behaviour of actors.
Competition
Those most likely to engage in action are those in competition and conflict with other groups.
Historically, the most common form has been among kinship groups
Modernization was supposed to reduce ethnic conflict, but it did not
Status competition (e.g, sex, age, and ethnicity) is prominent in our modern society
Postmodernism
Rejection of traditional explanations
Post-industrial literature stresses hi-tech
Distinctive characteristics of post-industrial and postmodern society have created new social movements
Criticism: these movements are not so new, feminist and environmental groups can be found earlier.
Culture and Social Movements
Cultural Conditions – Can make a social movement succeed or fail
Types of Cultural Conditions:
Feelings of oppression or discontent
Hostile beliefs towards other groups
Religious convictions
Transcendental beliefs
Ethnic or nationalist sentiments
Elements of culture a that lead members of a group to identify with one another
Putting It All Together
Institutionalization should be a variable
Symbolic and cognitive processes are crucial
Social breakdown does bring protest
Relative deprivation helps explain motives, as does expectation of success and selective incentives
Resources must be mobilized
Ideology and structure are important
New movements emphasize modern societies
Canadian Social Structure
and Collective Action
Social cleavage: division based on class, ethnicity, etc.
Regional cleavage: Prairie movements are the best-known regional ones:
Progressives, after WWI, for tariff reductions, absorbed by Liberals
Social Credit, 1935, anti-Eastern business in Alberta
CCF, 1933, which became NDP (Cont’d)
Canadian Social Structure
and Collective Action (cont’d)
Ethnic cleavage:
Quebec nationalism has been around for a long time; la survivance (survival as a distinct society)
Quiet Revolution, begun by Premier Lesage in early 1960s, to extend government powers
Parti Quebecois, first elected in 1976, enacted language legislation and lost two referendums
Less enthusiasm for separation now, with Charest Liberal government, but it may return
Social Movements
of the Future
Status movements are on the increase, especially because of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, (e.g., Disability Rights, Prisoners’ Rights, Gays and Lesbians, etc.).
Proliferation of groups will dilute advantages, but groups will likely form status blocs, especially if a group is perceived to have gained an advantage, (e.g., groups to challenge purported discrimination against white males and heterosexuals).
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